A compliment is something nice you to say to someone. But what is a backhanded compliment? Backhanded compliment Jonathan, Cathy just told me my script was good, surprisingly good. That, my friend is a bandhanded compliment. Yes, she was surprised it was good. So she expected it to be bad.
Oh, let it go, Anna. Backhanded or not, it's still a compliment. A Backhanded compliment seems like a nice comment, but it's not. It's an insult made to look like a compliment. As you saw with Anna, Backhanded compliments can upset people.